How A Priori Knowledge is Possible: A Russellian Appraisal of Kant

Abstract

The present paper, by offering a tricentennial tribute to Kant’s birth anniversary, traces a Russellian appraisal of the latter’s contributions to philosophy. The appraisal outlines Russell’s appreciation of Kant’s great philosophical importance by centring round its discussion primarily on the chapter How A Priori Knowledge is Possible authored by the former. As a prelude to the discussion presented through this chapter, the paper illustrates few relevant points set out in the chapter On Our Knowledge of General Principles authored by Russell himself. To lay down the appraisal, the paper begins with a discussion on Kant’s groundbreaking call to reason to emphasize reason’s critique of its own. It is by critiquing reason Kant seeks to examine to what extent human reason is capable of a priori knowledge. Discussion on Kant’s call to reason is succeeded by a Russellian analysis of the knowledge of general principles where he brings into light the relevance of various logical and non-logical a priori principles for philosophy, and also the importance of great historic controversy in philosophy between the empiricists and the rationalists. As Russell’s analysis of general principles leads him to take up and outline Kant’s philosophy, the paper, in the third section, provides the former’s appreciation and critique of the latter. In his critique, Russell’s focus is on Kant’s method. The critique that considers one main objection as fatal is Kant’s attempt to deal with the problem of a priori knowledge by his method. The paper takes up Russell’s deliberations on such fatal objection. Finally, the paper, in the light of the preceding sections, makes an attempt to analyse the reasons behind Russell’s admiration for Kant despite his rejection of the latter’s philosophy. The paper, thus, besides featuring Kant’s philosophical contributions, also reveals Russell’s spirit as a historian of philosophy.